“Lethal autonomous weapons is an issue that causes the third revolution in warfare. Once finished, they will authorize armed battle to be fought on a scale greater than ever, and at timescales faster than humans can understand,” the scholars warned in an open letter published on Monday.
“These can be weapons of horror, weapons that oppressors and terrorists use against innocent populations, and weapons hacked to work in unacceptable ways,” the letter says.
Its signatories are of organizations spread across North America, Europe, Africa and Asia, including Mustafa Suleyman, an artificial intelligence expert at Google.
“Unlike other possible manifestations of AI, which still reside in the realm of science fiction, autonomous weaponry systems are on the cusp of developing right now and have a very substantial potential to cause notable harm to innocent people along with global volatility,” said Ryan Gariepy, the founder of Clearpath Robotics and the first man to sign the letter.
More than 12 countries including the United States, China, Israel, South Korea, Russia, and Britain are currently producing autonomous weapons systems, according to Human Rights Watch.
Musk has been urging of the dangers of artificial intelligence for ages, saying it’s “probably more dangerous than nukes.” As pressures spiked over North Korea this period, he weighed in, saying AI poses “largely more risk” than Kim Jong Un’s regime.
Besides operating Tesla and SpaceX, Musk also has a startup building tools to connect the human brain to computers in an effort to develop artificial intelligence in a process that will have an obstinate effect on humanity.
The open letter to the United Nations was published at an artificial intelligence convention in Melbourne ahead of a U.N. meeting of state specialists on autonomous weapons.
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